Page 68 of Grave Situation

“The stone revealed to us that necromancers have begun raising zombies, and?—”

Coryn scoffs, the smile disappearing. “If you’re going to tell fairy stories, just don’t tell me anything. I don’t need to know. All I need is for the king to tell me to protect you, and I will, whatever you’re doing.”

Tia pinches the bridge of her nose, and I reach out to her.“It’s fine.”

“I don’t love putting our safety in the hands of someone who doesn’t use deductive reasoning to make decisions,”she snaps.

“Then put it in the stone’s hands. That’s what he is—another tool of prophecy, just like us.”I hate that concept so much, but there’s no denying it. Not anymore.

She nods curtly.

“It’s not a fairy story,” I tell Coryn. “You can speak to the king about this—or Master Haftel. They’ll confirm what I’m saying. A long time ago, necromancers raised zombies and used them to wage war against the nations of the continent. It was long and bloody, and millions died. We won in the end, and in an attempt to prevent it from ever happening again”—these words are bitter on my tongue, but I force myself to say them—“most of the details were wiped from history. Our ancestors believed that if people thought zombies were only a nightmare, a tale to scare children, nobody would ever again try to raise one.”

He frowns. “So how come you know this?”

“We’re taught a little more at the City of Knowledge. Part of the history classes at the academy include a very brief segmentabout the zombie wars and how terrible they were. Not enough information for anyone to know how to raise them—or how to stop them once they’re raised.”

The frown deepens. “Then how did someone raise some?”

Excellent question. I spread my hands. “We don’t know. It’s not the most important part right now—the stone told us that there’s a person, a champion, who can defeat the necromancers and the zombies. This is also in the prophecies, so we have a very obscure instruction manual. Our mission is to find that champion. The other side is trying to stop us, since they don’t want to be defeated.”

“I guess that makes sense.”

Cautiously, because this is where I might lose him again, I say, “Some of our attackers the other night were zombies. They looked just like ordinary men, but they wouldn’t die until I used magefire on them. Not even when we dismembered them.”

His eyes widen. “They wouldn’t die? Wait… zombies are when dead people are brought back to life, right?”

“No,” Jaimin interrupts sharply. “They arenotbrought back to life. It’s impossible to bring a dead person back to life, because their soul has departed from their body. Zombies are merely reanimated corpses.” Seeing Coryn’s confusion, he continues, “A necromancer finds a corpse—a dead body—and makes it move around like a living person—kill like a living person can—but it’s not alive. It has no thoughts or feelings, doesn’t need to eat or drink or sleep or breathe.”

That, Coryn understands, and sick revulsion is clear in his voice when he says, “Like a human puppet?”

Jaimin nods. “It’s desecration of the worst kind.”

“I don’t know about that, but it’s wrong to treat dead people that way,” Coryn declares. “You gotta stop them.”

“That’s our plan. We just have to find the champion and let them take over, and we need you to make sure we don’t die before we can do that,” I remind him.

He worries his lip with his teeth, making it red and puffy and entirely too pretty. “Did you say they don’t die? I’ve never fought an enemy who doesn’t die. That would change the odds—every one of theirs would become…” His face scrunches in concentration as he struggles to come up with a number. “…a lot.”

“They go down for a short while,” Tia assures him. “Dismember them if you can and get their weapons away from them. It won’t stop them, but it buys us time. The only two ways to kill them permanently are magefire and dragon fire. Luckily, we have both—Talon and Leicht. So your job—and mine—is to disable them long enough for Talon to kill them.”

Coryn nods confidently, his worry gone. “I can do that.”

“They’ll likely also have living humans with them, but it might be hard to tell the difference,” Jaimin warns. “Treat them all the same until we know otherwise.”

“Yeah, you said that before, that they look like normal. But I thought zombies were supposed to be all rotting and falling apart. Because they’redead people.”

I let Jaimin handle this, since he was the one who found the answer to begin with.

“We thought the same, but after the attack, the stone confirmed our theory that the zombies we met were made from the newly dead. Men who hadn’t died long enough ago to begin deco—uh, rotting.”

“So they might look normal, and I should treat anyone who attacks like they’re a zombie. Killing blow, disarm, dismember,” he recites. “Got it.”

I wait, but that seems to be it. “Do you have any questions?”

“When do you want to leave?”

“Uh…”Neveris what I want to say, but instead, I reach for the pouch around my neck. “We should ask the stone, I guess.”

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